featured blog posts

The Greek failure to successfully address tax evasion should prove instructive to Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, who in 2014 pledged to crack down on tax cheats. Greek measures to tackle evasion with enforcement have resulted in only small improvements. An enforcement only strategy should not be the model Ontario follows for tackling the underground economy. Relying on enforcement and punishment squeezes legitimate businesses who are already faced with high compliance costs and tax and regulatory burdens.

Demonstrating the Green Party's commitment to principled, thoughtful politics, each reason highlights a specific, deep-rooted problem and provides a long-term viable solution. The ultimate goal: build a better Canada for all Canadians, a Canada with a sustainable future grounded in responsible environmental stewardship, social justice and fiscal responsibility.

As the country's leading staffing agency, we're able to identify trends shaping the world of work before they become official statistics. In analyzing our own data and combining it with anecdotal evidence from employers we work with, we've identified four key areas to watch as the year plays out.

Canadians no longer need to make the false choice between the environment and the economy. On Monday in Vancouver, Justin Trudeau unveiled a detailed plan for real change that will create jobs, grow the economy and protect the environment.

Debt has been in the news a lot lately. The major news outlets in Canada are paying attention to our record-high household debt levels and are doing some fantastic reporting about the effects of oil prices, housing, health, divorce, and all the other factors that can damage a family's bottom line. Yet amid this rabble of expert voices and real Canadian tales of debt crisis, there was one lone dissenter.

The key to closing Canada's skills gap in the future lies in young people and according to a recent Randstad study, it seems that young Canadians are getting the message. There is a wealth of opportunity for career building within the various skilled trade sectors across the country, and people are taking notice.

Canada is in the midst of a unprecedented housing boom that seems likely to bust. I was recently in Canada and noticed a schizophrenic oscillation between housing exuberance and oil-price despair. What did it mean for the Canadian economy's outlook? Upon returning to the U.S., I did some research. What I found leads me to the conclusion that Canada is now among the most vulnerable large economies in the world. Here's why.

These factors have brought hard times to some industries and uncertainty about the impacts to the Canadian economy as the whole. While uncertainty is never comfortable, it can present some opportunities and challenges depending on your situation or sector. Here are three to watch for the rest of the year.

No matter how you slice it, Harper has failed to lead Canada towards a sustained economic recovery from the financial crisis seven years ago. It doesn't matter how much public money he spends on ads claiming otherwise. Facts are facts. So, what does a government facing re-election do when its top agenda item, economic management, is in tatters? It changes the channel to something else.

To reinforce his obvious campaign themes about fear and insecurity, Stephen Harper has taken to describing Canada's current economic situation as a "crisis." If that's his pitch, one should ask under whose watch did this so-called "crisis" develop? Our country is no doubt in an economic mess, but calling it a "crisis" is simply a scare tactic.

Tightening U.S. monetary policy suggests that the Canadian dollar will remain weak. And in spite of competitiveness concerns, exports are rising enough this year to suggest 10 per cent growth, and an added 6 per cent in 2015. This in turn will spur business investment, lifting Canadian GDP growth to 2.8 per cent in 2015.

Labour Day is a day of camaraderie and solidarity that I enjoy, and look forward to each year. It's a day to celebrate all that we've achieved, a day to feel the power of togetherness and to recommit ourselves to the struggle ahead. From Leamington, to Toronto, it's clear that this economy is not working for people and their families. Factories continue to close, and unemployment in this province remains stubbornly high. Our once strong, stable middle class is quickly becoming a class of precarious workers.

Income disparity also means that working and living in the same place is a luxury few of us can afford -- not just in third world countries, but in small Canadian rural communities as well. Ironically, our stronger economy is also leading to a weaker society. We can't be there for one another as much as we once were. We're too busy making money.

If Canada can make the right choice and tone down the 'dig baby dig, drill baby drill' mentality, not only would Canada not be worse off economically, but we would have a safer environment, and be able to seize the incredible opportunities to invest in the sophisticated clean technology that is going to power this century.

While the probability that a train-load of inappropriately classified oil products would careen down a hill in rural Quebec and explode, killing 47 people and contaminating a fragile lake ecosystem was so infinitesimally small as to be almost incalculable, the consequences were devastating and will be felt for generations.

About Economy Canada

Canada, a G7 country, boasts one of the world's largest economies, ranking 11th in the world by GDP. The country's focus in recent years on resource extraction has had both its good points and bad; good, because high energy and commodity prices kept Canada's economy humming during the economic downturn of recent years; bad, because resource extraction brings with it environmental controversy, such as the one surrounding the Keystone XL Pipeline. How Canada resolves these tensions, and builds an economy for the 21st century, is among the central questions facing the country.